I like the real guy who has no idea what grits are—I heard about that from the breakfast crowd, of course—the guy who has adamant opinions about bananas—Sutton told me about that pronouncement—and the guy whose favorite movie is a cartoon about monsters.
I’ve watched him play hockey. He’s amazing. Watching him was fun before I knew him—before Ikissedhim—and I think now it would, well, probably turn me on. But I’mreallylooking forward to him playing with a big foam cowboy hat on his head to a Shania Twain song. And Iknowthat’s going to turn me on.
But I also loved the look on his face when he first arrived for movie night and saw the decorations and food and realized what movie we were discussing.
I wanted to delight him, and it worked.
I love delighting people. I love making people smile and make that little gasp of surprised pleasure. But with Alex it was even better.
I’m in trouble.
I’mtryingnot to like him too much, and here I am feeling like Miss Freaking America because I made the big, cocky hockey player light up over a movie.
That we didn’t even watch.
“Chinchillas arenotrelated to otters!” Henry Bordelon says loudly. “Otters are not rodents! They are mustelids! Shame on all of you for not knowing that!”
“Wedoknow that, Henry Bordelon! Don’t you start acting like you’re so smart!” Caroline Robertson snaps.
“Well, then you wouldknowthey’re not related! Chinchillas are rodents!” Henry says.
“Maybe that’s the part they didn’t know,” Jake Clairborne offers.
“Then they should stay quiet,” Henry says with a frown.
“They do look a little alike,” Jake’s girlfriend, Madison, says.
“They most certainly donot,” Henry says, clearly affronted by the suggestion.
“Okay, I think movie night is over,” I say to Alex.
“You just call it at some point?”
I grin. “Yep. You know, when things start to go off the rails.”
He snorts.
And then Muriel officially wraps things up for me. She chucks a popcorn ball at her sister. The ball bounces off Patty’s shoulder and hits Niles Cooper on the cheek.
“Muriel!” at least four people say all at once.
“Time to go,” Henry declares, standing and folding his chair.
Caroline and Natalie follow suit, and soon everyone is gathering their blankets and chairs and heading for the snack table to grab leftovers to take home.
They call out their thanks to me and their goodbyes to each other as they go and within five minutes the area is ninety-nine percent cleared out.
“So what now?” Alex asks. “Want to have a drink? Take a walk? Have hot sex at…”
I wait for a moment, amused. Yeah, we can’t go back to his place, considering someone in my family is there manning the kitchen and bar, and my grandfather will be there to start the breakfast shift at five a.m..
“The back of my pickup?” he finally asks.
I laugh. “I haven’t had an offer like that in years.”
He moves closer. “Did you take your panties off in some lucky guy’s pickup, Wildflower?”
“Of course,” I say. “But that was before I knew there were places that sold sixty-nine-dollar cheese plates, that there were people who paid for sixty-nine-dollar cheese plates.”
